Prior to the advent of wireless navigation devices, drivers on the freeway often relied upon signs that notified them of services that could be accessed at the next freeway exit. This situation could lead to inadequate planning, including multiple intense conversations in vehicles during the short interval between the notification by sign and opportunities to exit the highway efficiently, regarding whether the passengers desired to exit the freeway to access the services. With the advent of wireless navigation devices, a vehicle passenger may now input a desired service (e.g., gas station, restaurant) while traveling in the vehicle along a route, and view a list of such service locations and a distance to each along the route.
As helpful as such wireless navigational devices may be, vehicle passengers are tasked with requesting a list of services from these devices prior to receiving a list of results. To accomplish this task, a passenger has to be cognizant of the desire to utilize a service ahead of time, and has to take the time to input the service request into the navigational device. This can result in many missed opportunities to utilize services that the user would otherwise have desired to use. As one example, this realization may arise after driving by a freeway exit, and hearing a young child plaintively announce from the back seat that “I have to go to the bathroom,” only to see a sign indicating “Next Exit 43 miles”. This is but one example of many in which systems that necessitate that users be cognizant of their own needs in order to request information on nearby services, fail to deliver satisfactory results for the user.